If you need to stretch your mind, I recommend you check out some of the articles and videos available on the Aeon website. As the website states about its purpose:
We ask the big, existentially significant questions and find the freshest, most original answers, provided by leading thinkers on philosophy, science, psychology, society and culture.
One recently posted video with US astrobiologist Lynn Rothschild is a fascinating discussion about the difficulties in humans surviving on another planet or moon, and some of the problems and potential solutions that need to be considered. The video ends with a Q&A where Dr. Rothschild goes into a variety of related topics.
The talk itself comes from The Long Now Foundation, which has this statement about Dr. Rothschild’s talk titled “Nature’s Hardware Store”:
In her Long Now Talk, Dr. Rothschild will open the doors to “Nature’s hardware store” — a vast, largely untapped reservoir of biological strategies available to scientists, engineers, and innovators. Dr. Rothschild’s own work in recent years has included 3D-printing trees, designing fungal-based housing fit for the moon, and building synthetic cells de novo in the lab. In doing so, she has connected theoretical insights about the very nature of life on this planet with practical applications and future directions for innovation on the hardest problems facing our civilization.
The foundation has many other other great talks, including science fiction writer Kim Stanley Robinson and public policy expert Stephen Heintz talking about geopolitics here on Earth.
But getting back to Aeon, some other videos for you to explore include:
- Mind-bending speed is the only way to reach the stars – here are three ways to do it
- Would children born beyond Earth ever be able to return to humanity’s home planet?
- Could we make a home on Mars? It would be a very unique psychological situation?
With the news seemingly on a doom loop these days, it is worth contemplating some new ideas, if only to give your mind a rest. For that reason, you need Aeon and The Long Now Foundation in your mental medicine cabinet.
Enjoy.
Our Awesome Universe 